f them, as I did formerly at Stamboul. It really seems to me as if all
I do here is a bitter parody of all I did over there.

This time, however, it is not that I care for this dwelling; it is only
because it is pretty and uncommon, and the sketch will be an interesting
souvenir.

I fetch, therefore, a leaf out of my album, and begin at once, seated
on the floor and leaning on my desk, ornamented with grasshoppers in
relief, while behind me, very, very close to me, the three women follow
the movements of my pencil with astonished attention. Japanese art being
entirely conventional, they have never before seen any one draw from
nature, and my style delights them. I may not perhaps possess the steady
and nimble touch of M. Sucre, as he groups his charming storks, but I am
master of a few notions of perspective which are wanting in him; and I
have been taught to draw things as I see them, without giving them an
ingeniously distorted and grimacing attitudes; and the three Japanese
are amazed at the air of reality displayed in my sketch.

With little shrieks of admiration, they point out to one another the
different things, as little by little their shape and form are outlined
in black on my paper. Chrysantheme gazes at me with a new kind of
interest "Anata itchiban!" she says (literally "Thou first!" meaning:
"You are really quite wonderful!")

Mademoiselle Oyouki is carried away by her admiration, and exclaims, in
a burst of enthusiasm:

"Anata bakari!" ("Thou alone!" that is to say: "There is no one like you
in the world, all the rest are mere rubbish!")

Madame Prune says nothing, but I can see that she does not think the
less; her languishing attitudes, her hand that at each moment gently
touches mine, confirm the suspicions that her look of dismay a few
moments ago awoke within me: evidently my physical charms speak to her
imagination, which in spite of years has remained full of romance! I
shall leave with the regret of having understood her too late!

Although the ladies are satisfied with my sketch, I am far from being
so. I have put everything in its place most exactly, but as a whole,
it has an ordinary, indifferent, French look which does not suit. The
sentiment is not given, and I almost wonder whether I should not have
done better to falsify the perspective--Japanese style--exaggerating to
the very utmost the already abnormal outlines of what I see before me.
And then the pictured dwelling lacks the frag